The invention relates to a screen, and more particularly, to a portable expandable screen for blocking passing motorists' and pedestrians' views of accidents on a roadway to prevent rubbernecking and promote traffic flow and increased highway safety.
Rubbernecking is the phenomena of motorists slowing down to observe an accident or anything unusual on the side of the road. Rubbernecking has gotten so bad that in some areas electronic traffic billboards started carrying messages which read, “Accident Ahead: Please Don't Rubberneck.” Displaying this message did not last very long as there was no evidence that it worked and it may have actually piqued drivers' curiosity and caused even more rubbernecking. In rubbernecking, a drivers' eyes involuntarily dart to the side of the road, while their foot instinctively lifts off of the gas pedal. The momentary slow down creates an imbalance in the space between cars, leading to what engineers affectionately card “accordion effect” as drivers halt and then accelerate. And, in a very short time drivers have concocted a traffic jam of their very own. That action shrinks the carrying capacity of the road, almost the same way a closed lane does. The effect bounces backward one car at a time, in a shock wave that lasts independently of the initial problem, so that there's often not even anything for the rubberneckers to see.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,036,249 to Kuntz discloses an accident shield device. U.S. Pat. No. 4,124,196 to Hipskind discloses a portable device for screening off an accident scene from view. U.S. Pat. No. 5,269,623 to Hanson discloses a rapidly deployable traffic screen. U.S. Pat. No. 4,465,262 to Itri et al. discloses a portable expandable barrier. U.S. Pat. No. 6,037,866 to Leibowitz discloses a hazard device for a vehicle. U.S. Pat. No. 4,186,912 to Byrd discloses a accident screen. U.S. Pat. No. 5,595,230 to Guerra discloses a crime scene body shield. U.S. Pat. No. 6,435,253 and United States publication #2002/0117270 A1 both to Steeves et al. discloses an extendable partition assembly.
While these units may be suitable for the particular purpose employed, or for general use, they would not be as suitable for the purposes of the present invention as disclosed hereafter.